We Are Undone
by Kitty in a Cornfield
Summary: We are undone...those were the words that Benedict Arnold said to Peggy. But Arnold could understand how true those words were for her. Spoilers for the Season 3 finale, PeggyXAndre, One-Shot


_We are undone…._

That was he said to her, but he didn't know—not really—how right he was. She stood there in the crowd of unsympathetic people, waiting for the drop from the scaffold, and tried to stop her heart from beating. There was too much to feel in that moment. Too many emotions pulling at her being, too many 'what if's and 'if only's that were whispering darkly in her soul. She couldn't feel them then. She couldn't bear the weight of them. It had never been for Arnold…it had all been for him. And now, it was all undone and Peggy was stuck in that moment, waiting for her love to die. When their eyes meet one last time across the crowd, a final look that's so filled with longing, she is sure that she will die with him.

Her heartache lasts for days, but she hardly notices it's there. Somewhere in her mind, Peggy thinks back on the events that led to the execution and she feels a swell of rage for the world. If Arnold had been stronger, had been better at job, if he hadn't needed to be coddled so much and been so foolish... Or perhaps it was Washington, or Tallmadge, who should bear the brunt of her anger. It was their war, after all. They had begun this slaughter and it was they who continued it. They had necessitated his work and his recruitment of Peggy. They were to blame for her love's death…only, as hard as she tried to hate them, she didn't. Because the truth is…

Well, the truth is that Peggy didn't give a fig for war. Her life had been comfortable and she had embraced her part in her world, playing the shallow young beauty with fickle attentions. She had accepted that that was what life is and she felt no discomfort in that idea. War was not something Peggy thought about, and it certainly wasn't something that she witnessed. He had changed all of that when he came to her. He was a challenge, and more than that, he challenged her. Perhaps the greatest gift he gave Peggy was seeing beyond what society told her she was and helping her feel something real, something that mattered, for the first time. He had changed everything for her.

She wanted so desperately to be hate him. She wanted to be angry for what he'd done. For changing things, for asking for her help. He had sent her to Arnold and left her to her fate, and all the while he filled appetites elsewhere. She had given in to Arnold for him—she had let herself be taken, fighting against the tears in her eyes at his unwanted touches, and thought that she was doing it for them…because he'd needed her help, and they could be together if only the war would end. How could he leave her then? And now he'd done it a second time, and Peggy stood there alone. She wanted so much to hate him, but how could she? How could she ever hate him?

 _We are undone_ … the words haunted Peggy. Somewhere, she knew, Benedict Arnold was trying to salvage the pieces of his life and pretend that he still had honor. He was still fighting some foolish battle, pretending that it still somehow mattered—that he was not, in fact, undone. For Peggy, there could be no such illusion. She could have given up everything and it wouldn't have mattered to her in the end…she could have lost anything else, except for him. She had loved John Andre with a fierceness she didn't know she had, and without him the world itself was undone. There had been only one body standing on the scaffold that day, but two people died the moment he fell. As she fled her home in the dark of night, Peggy knew her life had come to an end….but the end felt hopelessly endless.

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 **So, I have to admit, I kind of hated how their story ended in the season finale. Like, I understand that the show has to follow historical accuracy, so everyone knew it was coming, but still-Andre is one of the redcoats that you actually** ** _like_** **. And I enjoyed his storyline with Peggy. So this is what happens at 2am, when you can't sleep and you rewatch that episode...**


End file.
